The Inflatable Man

Six years after a car accident kills her five-year-old daughter Catie in front of her Kenilworth home, a shaky Suzanna Healey starts a new job to try to rebuild her life. Soon, her son Chris, a freshman at Princeton, storms home to confront his parents, who have refused to pay for a spring break trip to Mexico. After her chilly banker husband Bob moves downtown to pursue a fanciful relationship with a sexy young co-worker, Suzanna, alone and fearful, turns to a most unlikely source for comfort. The disastrous consequences of this chain of events compel Suzanna's former neighbor, Meredith Bennett, a Skokie prosecutor with two young daughters and a still attractive ex-husband , to rush in to investigate. The Inflatable Man explores the problem of dealing with past traumas - and the shattering results when people can't let go.
The Inflatable Man is Hope Sheffield's second Meredith Bennett mystery. Blood Mother is her first novel.